Database Management Articles
The rise of big data has garnered much of the attention in the data management arena lately. But it is not simply the sheer volume of data that is challenging data professionals. Many new types and brands of DBMSs are also popping up across organizations, bringing new problems for the data professionals who are tasked with managing them, and also giving rise to scores of "accidental database administrators" with no formal DBA training, a new Unisphere Research study reveals. The results of the survey are explained in a research report titled "Data Cross-Currents: 2011 Survey on Cross-Platform Database Administration."
Posted August 24, 2011
The rise of big data has garnered much of the attention in the data management arena lately. But it is not simply the sheer volume of data that is challenging data professionals. Many new types and brands of DBMSs are also popping up across organizations, bringing new problems for the data professionals who are tasked with managing them, and also giving rise to scores of "accidental database administrators" with no formal DBA training, a new Unisphere Research study reveals. The results of the survey are explained in a report titled "Data Cross-Currents: 2011 Survey on Cross-Platform Database Administration," now available from Quest Software.
Posted August 24, 2011
EnterpriseDB, a provider of PostgreSQL and Oracle compatibility products and services, has announced general availability of Postgres Enterprise Manager, which allows developers and DBAs to monitor, manage, and tune both PostgreSQL and Postgres Plus Advanced Server installations regardless of the platform they run on - from a single console application. "Now, customers can easily ramp up their PostgreSQL footprint at a fraction of the cost of proprietary alternatives," said Ed Boyajian, president and CEO of EnterpriseDB.
Posted August 23, 2011
HP and Autonomy Corporation plc have announced plans for HP (through an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary, HP SPV) to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Autonomy for £25.50 ($42.11) per share in cash. "Together with Autonomy, we plan to reinvent how both unstructured and structured data is processed, analyzed, optimized, automated and protected. Autonomy has an attractive business model, including a strong cloud-based solution set, which is aligned with HP's efforts to improve our portfolio mix," said Léo Apotheker, HP president and chief executive officer, in a statement issued by the company.
Posted August 23, 2011
Ntirety has announced that it will undergo the MSPAlliance's (MSPA) Unified Certification Standard for Cloud and Managed Service Providers audit (UCS). UCS is the first program of its kind, specifically designed and created to provide business consumers of cloud and managed services with the assurance that the service provider they hire meets or exceeds the highest principles of quality in areas such as financial stability, facilities, managed services practices, and customer satisfaction. "As the market matures for remote DBA companies, the bar has been getting raised higher and higher," Michael Corey, founder and president of Ntirety, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted August 18, 2011
Over the years, countless papers and articles have been written on enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation project success rates and why ERP projects fail. Interestingly enough, the reasons that projects fail are the same today as they were 10 years ago: lack of top management commitment, unrealistic expectations, poor requirements definition, improper package selection, gaps between software and business requirements, inadequate resources, underestimating time and cost, poor project management, lack of methodology, underestimating impact of change, lack of training and education, and last, but not least, poor communication.
Posted August 11, 2011
The Broadway tune goes, "The sun will come out tomorrow ... it's only a day away." The words from this optimistic jingle are often heard on IT projects that are overburdened with features and functions. On any project of significant size the list of desired things often becomes larger than the budgeted resources or time. Faced with limiting circumstances, the only option becomes aligning the work effort with the constraints and only doing what fits within those constraints. The items are "timeboxed," and the amount of planned work is exactly the amount of allowed work. Some things remain in, while other features are left out. Alternatively, responsibility for controlling a project may be ignored and the end date arrives with some things simply not completed. Essentially, a project is timeboxed by default.
Posted August 11, 2011
Often, when the business of data management frustrates me, I look for inspiration in what may seem at first glance to be odd places. For instance, I think the Lewis Carroll "Alice in Wonderland" books offer sage advice for our particular industry.
Posted August 11, 2011
In last month's column, "2012 Might Really Be the End of the World as We Know It," I described a number of major developments in the IT industry that are likely to disrupt the life of database professionals everywhere. I categorize those four disrupters - virtualization, cloud computing, solid state drives (SSD), and advanced multi-core CPUs - into two broad groups. I'm going to continue an analysis of these disruptive technologies in inverse order. Today, let's discuss SSDs.
Posted August 11, 2011
Quest Software, Inc. expanded its Toad product portfolio with the addition of free and commercial versions of Toad for Sybase. The new suite adds Sybase ASE, Sybase IQ and SQL Anywhere to Toad's list of supported relational and non-relational database platforms. Toad is a cross-platform database management toolset. There have already been more than 15,000 downloads of the Toad for Sybase beta, which has many of the same features as Toad's other database products, Claudia Fernandez, director of product management, Toad solutions for Quest, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted August 09, 2011
InterSystems Corporation has announced that Partners HealthCare Systems is now providing clinicians throughout its integrated delivery network (IDN) with mobile access to its electronic health record (EHR). The InterSystems CACHÉ high-performance object database is the foundation platform for Partners HealthCare's EHR and for hundreds of clinical applications used by thousands of clinicians throughout the IDN. "Mobility is becoming a watchword in the healthcare sector," observes Paul Grabscheid, InterSystems vice president of Strategic Planning. "The Partners mEHR provides clinicians with the ultimate in mobility by delivering the information they want, when and where they want it, in the presentation form that they want and expect."
Posted August 09, 2011
The rise of big data has garnered much of the attention in the data management arena lately. But it is not simply the sheer volume of data that is challenging data professionals. Many new types and brands of DBMSs are also popping up across organizations, bringing new problems for the data professionals who are tasked with managing them, and also giving rise to scores of "accidental database administrators" with no formal DBA training, a new Unisphere Research study reveals.
Posted August 04, 2011
Oracle's S. Ramakrishnan, group vice president and general manager for Oracle Financial Services Analytical Applications, was in New York last week to provide an update on how financial services institutions are leveraging tailored technology from Oracle - including the recently announced Oracle Financial Services Data Warehouse - to manage the complex information needed to compete profitably and effectively address stringent regulatory requirements.
Posted August 04, 2011
Oracle announced that early access to new features of MySQL 5.6 is available for the community to test, deploy and provide feedback.The latest features are focused on better scalability, performance and flexibility. Enhancements include the InnoDB storage engine, to provide support for full text search, greater performance for write-intensive applications, and better scalability under high concurrency/user loads. In addition, new and improved MySQL replication features are intended to help with performance, scale-out and data integration.
Posted August 04, 2011
Tableau Software, a provider of business intelligence software, has announced the general availability of Tableau 6.1. "This is the first version of Tableau that is optimized for mobile devices and in particular, the iPad," Francois Ajenstat, director, Product Management, Tableau Software, tells 5 Minute Briefing. "Organizations of all sizes are increasingly getting their analytics on the go so they can make better decisions wherever they are. We are trying to make that kind of delivery extremely easy."
Posted August 02, 2011
Expanding its existing product portfolio, Informatica Corporation now offers Universal Data Replication, giving customers more options to meet their business continuity, big data and operational data integration needs. A part of the Informatica Platform, Informatica's new data replication technology includes Informatica Fast Clone which automates the cloning of application data and Informatica Data Replication which manages the capture, routing and delivery of high-volume transaction data across diverse systems in real time with minimal source system impact.
Posted August 02, 2011
Sybase, an SAP company, has announced the general availability of Sybase IQ 15.3, which aims to help enterprise IT departments overcome the scalability limitations of many data warehouse approaches. By implementing a business analytics information platform that allows sharing of computing and data resources through the new Sybase IQ PlexQ technology, the company says enterprises can break down user and information silos to increase analytics adoption throughout their entire organization. That is the major theme for 15.3 - not only handling even bigger data within the PlexQ environment, but also handling many more users in a scalable way, David Jonker, senior product marketing manager of Sybase IQ, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted July 27, 2011
Less than one year following its acquisition of Sybase, SAP AG is opening up mobile solutions from the Sybase portfolio to partners within the global SAP ecosystem. This marks the first time that SAP value-added resellers (VARs) that are currently authorized to sell SAP BusinessObjects and SAP Business All-in-One solutions get the opportunity to sell select Sybase-branded enterprise mobility apps and solutions for application development, device management and security. "Making Sybase solutions available through our existing reselling partners around the world allows us to reach a wider array of customers, both large and small, and allows customers to team up with the best partners to meet their distinct mobility needs," said Friedrich Neumeyer, senior vice president, Volume Reseller and Service Partners, Global Ecosystem and Channels, SAP.
Posted July 27, 2011
Embarcadero Technologies, a provider of administration tools for database platforms, is shipping a new version of its DB PowerStudio suite that includes new capabilities within its multi-DBMS management suite. Enhancements include features for optimizing SQL with fewer clicks, new database and schema change management functionality, improved reporting features and faster performance across all tools. Together, these enhancements make it easier for DBAs and developers to improve database performance and to carry out their work with greater efficiency. "With our XE2 database products, we're giving database professionals, especially those tasked with working in multi-DBMS environments, a set of tools that enables them to get their job done faster, more efficiently, and with higher dependability and quality," Scott Walz, senior director of product management for Embarcadero, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted July 27, 2011
Registration is now open for TechWave 2011, which will be co-located with SAP TechEd, September 12-16 at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas, NV. TechWave will continue to deliver targeted training on Sybase products, plus offer attendees access to TechEd keynote sessions, exhibits, special event and other networking functions.
Posted July 27, 2011
There is no doubt that virtualization is radically changing the shape of IT infrastructure, transforming the way applications are deployed and services delivered. Databases are among the last of the tier 1 applications to be hosted on virtual servers, but the past year has seen a huge wave of increase for production Oracle, SQL Server and other databases on VMware platforms. For all the benefits of virtualization, including cost-effectiveness, there are some impacts on the IT staff involved. Unfortunately for the DBAs virtualization often means losing control and visibility of their systems, which can ultimately hinder their ability to deliver database-oriented business solutions. While in the past DBAs had perfect visibility to the physical servers hosting the databases, the virtualization layers and the tools to manage them are typically out of bounds to them. While all the excitement of late has centered on VMware and other virtual machine systems, the DBAs have a valid reason for skepticism.
Posted July 27, 2011
Given all of the recent discussion around big data, NoSQL and NewSQL, this is a good opportunity to visit a topic I believe will be (or should be) forefront in our minds for the next several years - high velocity transactional systems. Let's start with a description of the problem. High velocity transactional applications have input streams that can reach millions of database operations per second under load. To complicate the problem, many of these systems simply cannot tolerate data inconsistencies.
Posted July 27, 2011
Oracle has introduced the Oracle Exadata Storage Expansion Rack to offer customers a cost-effective way to add storage to an Oracle Exadata Database Machine. "There are customers, earlier Exadata Database Machine customers, that have now started to fill up the disks that they have on the Database Machine and they are starting to look for ways to expand their storage capacity, and so this is going to be really welcome for them," says Tim Shetler, vice president of Product Management, Oracle.
Posted July 27, 2011
Sybase, an SAP company, has announced the general availability of Sybase IQ 15.3, which aims to help enterprise IT departments overcome the scalability limitations of many data warehouse approaches. By implementing a business analytics information platform that allows sharing of computing and data resources through the new Sybase IQ PlexQ technology, the company says enterprises can break down user and information silos to increase analytics adoption throughout their entire organization. There is a lot of talk about big data, but how to manage it and analyze it is only half the problem, observes David Jonker, senior product marketing manager of Sybase IQ. "The other half is how do you make it more pervasive throughout the enterprise and from our perspective that is where a lot of the existing data warehousing solutions fall down."
Posted July 27, 2011
EnterpriseDB, a provider of PostgreSQL and Oracle compatibility products and services, announced general availability of Postgres Plus Advanced Server 9.0. featuring improvements such as enriched database performance and availability, and increased Oracle compatibility.
Posted July 19, 2011
Naïve approaches to business intelligence will occasionally trap designers as they juggle operational data stores and data warehouses. The trap results from an honest endeavor to simplify designs and increase consistency throughout the solution. Under the umbrella of consistency a designer may plan for a reference table used for operational look-ups to perform a second service as a star schema dimensional table. Some or all reference tables then are declared by fiat to also be dimensions. While on a superficial level there are similarities between dimension tables and more normalized look up or reference tables, fundamentally these two concepts are separate things.
Posted July 07, 2011
Like most people, I chuckled under my breath when doomsayers started publishing books about the apocalypse predicted by their interpretation of the Mayan calendar. In their view, the Mayan calendar ends in 2012 and thus spells doom for us all - despite the fact that the classical Mayan calendar, like ours today, was cyclical. But as I was considering some of the momentous and disruptive changes we're facing lately, it suddenly hit me. The year 2012 might be the year when life as we've known it as IT and data professionals changes, completely and irrevocably
Posted July 07, 2011
Simplification is important in today's era of increasing complexity and ever-changing software environments. A key component of simplification is to remember the basics and apply some elementary rules and practices to your database environment. Many problems arise because we don't keep track of the things most of us already know. I stumbled upon the idea for this month's column after recalling Malcolm Gladwell's excellent business book Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. In this book, Gladwell offers up case studies and examples depicting the benefit of our "adaptive unconscious" - a powerful innate ability that provides us with instant and sophisticated information.
Posted July 07, 2011
Time series data is a sequence of data points typically measured at successive times and may be spaced at uniform time intervals. Time-stamped data can be analyzed to extract meaningful statistics or other characteristics of the data. It can also be used to forecast future events based on known past events. Time series data enables applications such as economic forecasting, census analysis and forecasting, fleet management, stock market analysis, and smart energy metering. Because it is time-stamped, time series data has a special internal structure that differs from relational data. Additionally, many applications such as smart metering store data at frequent intervals that require massive storage capacity. For these reasons, it is not sufficient to manage time series information using the traditional relational approach of storing one row for each time series entry.
Posted July 07, 2011
Today, we operate in a global economy at internet speed. Globalization of our workforce has shifted the way work gets done. The explosion of wireless and edge technology has raised the expectations of consumers, who are more informed, educated, and knowledgeable about products and services. This changing landscape places immense pressure on business applications in organizations worldwide. Critical application outages caused by software defects can cost the business millions of dollars in revenue for every hour of downtime.
Posted July 07, 2011
As the economy shifts to expansion mode, and businesses start hiring again, a familiar challenge is rearing its head. Companies are scrambling to find the talent needed to effectively run, maintain, and expand their technology platforms. This is not a new problem by any means, but this time around, it is taking on a greater urgency, as just about every organization relies on information technology to be competitive and responsive to growth opportunities. A new survey of 376 employers finds a majority depend on the educational sector - universities and colleges - to provide key IT skills, often in conjunction with their own internal training efforts. However, few of the executives and managers hiring out of colleges are entirely satisfied with the readiness of graduates.
Posted July 07, 2011
More than 1,000 Oracle Exadata Database Machines are now installed at customer sites globally, Oracle has announced. In total, the Oracle Exadata Database Machine - a complete package of servers, storage, networking, and software that is massively scalable, secure, and redundant - has been implemented by customers in 67 countries across 23 industries to power demanding database applications.
Posted July 06, 2011
Oracle has announced the first Oracle VM Template for MySQL Enterprise Edition. The aim of the new Oracle VM Template for MySQL is to help eliminate manual configuration efforts and risks by providing a pre-installed, pre-configured and certified software stack that includes Oracle VM Server for x86, Oracle Linux with the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel and MySQL Enterprise Edition. "By using the Oracle VM Template for MySQL Enterprise Edition, organizations do not have to spend the time downloading, installing, configuring and testing all the components together before deploying in production," an Oracle spokesperson tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted July 06, 2011
Embarcadero Technologies, a provider of administration tools for database platforms, is shipping a new version of its DB PowerStudio suite that includes new capabilities within its multi-DBMS management suite. Enhancements include features for optimizing SQL with fewer clicks, new database and schema change management functionality, improved reporting features and faster performance across all tools. Together, these enhancements make it easier for DBAs and developers to improve database performance and to carry out their work with greater efficiency. "With our XE2 database products, we're giving database professionals, especially those tasked with working in multi-DBMS environments, a set of tools that enables them to get their job done faster, more efficiently, and with higher dependability and quality," Scott Walz, senior director of product management for Embarcadero, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted July 06, 2011
The PASS Summit 2011 Community Sessions have been finalized. Details on all community sessions, including four new half-day sessions, are now accessible on the PASS website. There are only a couple of days left to take advantage of savings on PASS Summit 2011. PASS is encouraging attendees to register by June 30 before the rate increases.
Posted June 28, 2011
Representing a continued expansion of its big data analytics portfolio, IBM has introduced a new addition to the Netezza product family of analytics appliances that is designed to help organizations uncover patterns and trends from extremely large data sets. The appliance is the first to be delivered by IBM since it acquired Netezza in November 2010. According to IBM, using the new appliance, businesses can now more easily sift through petabytes of data, including banking and mobile phone transactions, insurance claims, electronic medical records, and sales information, and they can also analyze this information to reveal new trends on consumer sentiment, product safety, and sales and marketing effectiveness. "This new appliance takes the scalability to a completely new dimension," says Razi Raziuddin, senior director of product management at IBM Netezza.
Posted June 24, 2011
Oracle has announced the availability of Oracle JDeveloper 11g Release 2. Part of Oracle Fusion Middleware 11g, Oracle JDeveloper is a free, full-featured IDE. "It's a very broad and very productive environment targeted toward Oracle developers in the Java environment," says Bill Pataky, vice president of product management, Oracle, tells 5 Minute Briefing. The new release enhances the overall development experience by delivering an improved IDE, including support for new technologies and standards, as well as updates to Oracle Application Development Framework (ADF) 11g. "Java developers will immediately notice the difference."
Posted June 24, 2011
With data breaches rocking large organizations with alarming regularity, Application Security, Inc. (AppSec), a provider of database security, risk and compliance solutions for the enterprise, today announced new enhancements to its flagship enterprise platform, DbProtect. The latest version (v6.3) of the database security solution now includes the ability to block real-time attack and unauthorized activity. In addition, DbProtect will now include rights management support for IBM DB2 and Sybase ASE environments, joining the previously announced capabilities for Oracle Database and Microsoft SQL Server. "AppSec already offers proactive measures that short-circuit attacks in their early stages, and now we're bolstering those capabilities with an active defense," says says Josh Shaul, CTO, AppSec.
Posted June 22, 2011
When you think of mission-critical services, perhaps none is as critical as electrical service. Not much can happen in modern businesses, government offices, or even homes without it. Central Vermont Public Service (CVPS) is the largest electric company in Vermont. More than 159,000 customers in 163 communities rely on the electrical service CVPS provides. And, according to J.D. Power and Associates, a global marketing and surveying company, for overall customer satisfaction, CVPS continues to rank in the top tier of utilities in the eastern region, more than 50 points above the regional average.
Posted June 22, 2011
ParAccel, Inc., an analytic platform provider, announced the latest version of its flagship technology which introduces analytic integration for a wide range of analytic tools and data sources. ParAccel Analytic Database 3.1 (PADB 3.1) enables organizations to combine all internal and external data sources, both structured and unstructured, into analysis work."Analytic integration delivers new applications and analytic capabilities to our customers," says Tarun Loomba, chief marketing officer of ParAccel, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
Posted June 21, 2011
Oracle announced a new TPC-H 1TB benchmark, which showcases the scalability of Oracle Database 11g Release 2 running on Oracle's SPARC Enterprise M8000 server.
Posted June 15, 2011
Oracle VM Server for SPARC 2.1 delivers live migration capabilities to the SPARC T-series server family, including SPARC T3, UltraSPARC T2 Plus and UltraSPARC T2 based servers, allowing customers to quickly migrate running domains from one physical server to another, eliminating application outages and server downtime. In addition, Oracle Enterprise Manager Ops Center Virtualization Management Pack provides full lifecycle management of Oracle VM Server for SPARC.
Posted June 15, 2011
Confio Software, maker of the Ignite8 performance analysis software tool, has introduced IgniteVM, targeted specifically at DBAs to monitor and ensure database performance in a VMware environment. IgniteVM provides visibility beyond the database and into the virtual server layers, reducing the risk of database performance issues and helping to enable a successful physical to virtual (P2V) transition. With IgniteVM, which is focused squarely on the DBA and the DBA management team, Confio aims to reduce risk and increase visibility by combining the essential database response monitoring available in Confio's Ignite8 tool with non-intrusive VMware visibility.
Posted June 15, 2011